Police beat: A summary report of Craig Police Department activity for April 2012

Below is my report to the Craig City Council on police department activity for April.

Crime summary:

The police department responded to 1,194 requests for service in April and Community Service responded to 148 requests for service.

Crimes of the month (written by Administrative Sgt. John Forgay):

Once again the antennas on top of the sand rocks have exerted their power. Officers received a report from a local restaurant of a male harassing customers and staff. However, the subject had left and walked to another business.

The complaining party, an employee of the restaurant, explained that the subject causing the problem had threatened him (terms like “shoot” and “kill” fit the category) and was talking about strange things to customers sitting at their tables.

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The subject was then contacted by officers at the next business he had walked to, and he immediately started to threaten the officers (please see the above terminology) and using extremely vulgar/offensive comments toward them (as if the threats weren’t enough). Attempts to rationally have a discussion with the subject continued to be met with offensive comments, discussions of bombs, Iraq, the Oklahoma City bombing, to include the subject advising he was Saddam Hussein. Saddam, clearly not from Craig, was escorted to the Moffat County Public Safety Center.

A traffic stop was initiated after the officer saw reckless (legalese for stupid) driving on the part of a truck pulling out of a local eating/drinking establishment.

The driver’s excuse: “that was my friend,” and I was just “messing around,” speaking of the car he almost hit. Asked if he had been drinking, he said he had been, basically since eating lunch around noon.

When asked if he knew the time, he replied about “5:30 or so.” It was 7 p.m., close but no cigar.

He had a request, however: “Could I just park my truck and go back to my room?” Not. Escorted.

Say what No. 1: There was a call of a suspicious vehicle in the cemetery. A male and female from another city were contacted and the female had warrants for her arrest.

She was informed of this, to which she immediately asked: “Are you serious?”

OK, you’re from out of town, in the cemetery at 10 p.m., plus it was Friday the 13th.

Are we serious? Escorted.

Say what No. 2: After being taken into custody for driving under the influence of drugs, a 20-year-old was placed in the back of an officer’s patrol vehicle.

Another officer was walking by when she knocked on the car door. He opened the door to ask what she wanted and she asked him if he “saw the tree to the north of us change color.”

He tried to clarify if she meant the dead one or the green one next to it. She said it was “the green one,” apparently thinking it was dead and had just come back to life.

Really? Escorted.

Who dat?: Responding to a call of loud music in the parking lot of a local motel, officers came into contact with a male subject sitting in a vehicle with a beer in his hand. This resulted in a DUI arrest.

Short story: He had a warrant for his arrest. Long story: After some research, he had at least seven different names, four different dates of birth, four different Social Security numbers, numerous arrests under different names to include four DUI arrests and a revoked license as an “habitual traffic offender,” plus three previous deportations back to Mexico.

How bad is it when you are using false names and you still have arrest warrants under those names? Escorted.

Community service:

Community Service Officers Josh Wright and Jill Nelson handled the following calls in April:

• Red-tagged six abandoned vehicles. One vehicle was towed.

• Five weed complaints.

• Six code violations.

• Forty-one junk/trash violations.

• Eight administrative warnings for abandoned vehicles were issued.

• Seven parking violation warnings were issued.

• No parking citations were issued.

• No code citations were issued.

Miscellaneous:

• Two officers have been hired to fill our vacant positions. Officer Mike Edwards was selected to fill the position of corporal, effective April 1, which was vacated when Travis Young was selected to fill the vacant detective position. April 9 was the start date for our new officers, Jeff Bond and Mark Brown.

• On April 11, Administrative Sgt. John Forgay and Detective Dale Secules presented an identity theft presentation at Wellness Wednesday to approximately 50 people.

• It was Click It or Ticket Time with the enforcement period running from April 2 through 8. We had 23 hours during this time to actively enforce primary (child) and secondary seatbelt laws through various traffic-related contacts.

• On April 28, Commander Bill Leonard and Administrative Sgt. John Forgay participated in the National Prescription Drug Take Back Day.

• Several employees participated in the 2012 Celebrate Children Festival, which took place April 28 at Centennial Mall. The festival is a carnival atmosphere that provides different booths and stations with fun activities for children and free information for parents.

Training:

• In April, sergeants Brian Soper, Tony Fandel and Corey Wagner attended week one of the Leadership in Police Organizations training course in Grand Junction. This course is based on sound theory and research and, most importantly, on the realities of police work.

Week one of the class focuses on the individual system and covers behavioral science topics like individual differences, equity theory, attribution theory, effective followership and expectancy theory of motivation and goal setting. They also started the second week, which carries over into the first week of May. Week two covers the group system with topics focused on group structure, development, socialization, cohesion, decision making in groups and intergroup conflict management.

• The Colorado Association of Chiefs of Police and our department has adopted the LPO course as the state’s leadership training model. Once the sergeants complete the three-week course, all of our command and first-line supervisors will have been trained in this leadership model.

• On April 1, I facilitated week three of the LPO leadership training course in Loveland. This part of the class focuses on organizational issues concerning our environment, culture, change and ethics. The Colorado Association of Police Chiefs has adopted the LPO course as the state’s leadership training model.

• On April 12, officers Jeff Bond and Mark Brown successfully completed a basic course in police defensive tactics and officer safety at the Moffat County Public Safety Center.

• On April 16 through 20, Community Service Officer Jill Nelson attended the 2012 CAACO Spring Training Conference in Lakewood.